Rubio in Livonia: ‘We can be better’

Livonia resident Marge Schoen knows right where the newly-autographed Marco Rubio campaign sign is going in her home.

She was one of the few who was able to get the U.S. Senator from Florida and presidential candidate to sign her sign.

“This is going in the window,” she said.

Schoen was one of many people who saw Rubio give a campaign speech Thursday evening at the Republican field office on Seven Mile in Livonia. Rubio was in Michigan for the day, first speaking at the Detroit Economic Club around the lunch hour and came over to Livonia to give remarks and shake hands with the crowd.

He talked on several issues, including education and a need for increased vocational training for skilled trades such as welding and manufacturing. He said southeast Michigan has seen the changes being made in a global economy, and said the country needs leadership that can help continue that transition and lead it to the future.

“This is an economic transformation,” he said. “I would say no other part of the country understands that more than Detroit and its suburbs.”

He stressed how important it was to stick up for American allies, including Israel, and criticized President Barack Obama’s Iran Deal, saying it could give them the ability to produce a missile that could eventually reach the continental U.S.

“We cannot continue this way forward,” Rubio said. “We need to have the strongest, most powerful military in the world.”

Taylor resident Ron Vaughan said he was still figuring out who he would support when the presidential primary comes to Michigan in March, but wanted to drive up and see Rubio speak.

He said Rubio’s positions on education and foreign relations stuck out with him the most.

“I came because he’s running for president of the United States, and I’ve always voted Republican. I thought it was very good,” he said about Rubio’s talk. “Rubio would be a good man.”

Rubio is the second presidential candidate to stop in at the Livonia GOP field office in the past year. Republican and U.S. Sen. Rand Paul stopped in for a campaign talk last fall before the mid-term elections, though he did not announced his presidential candidacy until several months later.

While some candidates who are running are claiming to want to make the country great again, Rubio said, the country is already great but needs improvement.

“Anyone who doubts that America is great should ask themselves, ‘What country would you rather be?’” he said. “What nation would you trade places with?

“The issue is not that we are great, but we could be greater. We’re not fulfilling our potential. But we can.”